Gore to Release Cyberstalking Report, Call for Tougher Laws

Calling attention to one of the most disturbing new breeds of online crime, Vice President Al Gore is expected to call for stronger laws against cyberstalking today while meeting with victims of the crime at San Diego State University.

Gore is also expected to release a new Justice Department report on cyberstalking which says that many law enforcement agencies underestimate the magnitude and seriousness of the problem.

Cyberstalking cases typically involve threats delivered by e-mail or other means over the Internet. But the most terrifying case took place in Los Angeles earlier this year when a 50-year-old security guard tried to use the Internet to solicit the rape of a woman who had scorned him.

“Cyberstalking is a very serious new problem confronting us in the Information Age,” Gore said in a statement. “As more and more Americans are going online--particularly our children--it is critical that they are protected from online stalking.”

With that in mind, Gore is expected to urge that federal laws be amended to prohibit the transmission of any communication “with intent to threaten or harass another person” and that places that person “in reasonable fear of death or bodily injury.”

Gore also plans to call on states to review their laws to address cyberstalking. California was the first state to pass an anti-stalking law when it did so in 1990, and was also the first to specifically outlaw cyberstalking last year.

But according to the new Justice Department report, fewer than one-third of the states have anti-stalking laws that explicitly cover stalking via the Internet, e-mail, pagers or other electronic communications.

The report was produced after Gore asked Atty. Gen. Janet Reno in February to study the problem and offer recommendations.

In emphasizing the issue and staging a meeting with cyberstalking victims, Gore may be seeking to burnish simultaneously his anti-crime and Internet-savvy credentials at a time when he is seeking the Democratic Party’s nomination for the presidency.

The report laments the absence of comprehensive, nationwide data on the extent of cyberstalking in the United States but asserts that anecdotal evidence suggests the crime is on the rise.

For instance, the report includes statistics from the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office showing that about 20% of the 600 cases handled by its Stalking and Threat Assessment Unit involved e-mail or other electronic communications.

It also recounts the harrowing case of a 28-year-old resident of North Hollywood who was repeatedly harassed in 1998 by a series of men responding to ads placed on the Internet in her name that made it appear she had fantasies of being raped.

Gary S. Dellapenta, a former security guard in Encino, pleaded guilty to the crime in April. He faces up to six years in prison. The prosecutor in the Dellapenta case is expected to attend the meeting with Gore today at San Diego State.

Another recent case centered on a graduate student at the University of San Diego who sent hundreds of threatening e-mails to five female university students over the course of a year. He too pleaded guilty and faces up to six years in prison.